Ice and Fire
by MadeOfSquirrels
Summary: Young!Loki and Young!Thor fic. Thor drags everyone and everything around him into terrible scrapes. Movieverse.


"Thor! Thor!"

Thor rolled his eyes and turned around. Running – more like stumbling – his way towards him across the gardens was Loki, clutching a book and looking generally _too_ eager to please.

"Loki, leave me alone," he mumbled, and Loki stopped, looking hurt.

"Father told me I should come and play with you instead of reading dusty old books of magic," he said, sounding pained, and waved the book at him. "Please, brother. I'll be quiet, and just sit and read, but let me follow you."

"Books of magic? Brother, the only noble art is fighting," Thor laughed, plucking the book out of his hands, and turned back to his friends, who all nodded. "Magic is for those who wish to fight from the shadows!"

"Oh, Thor, let Loki have his books back," Sif said sympathetically, and tucked her black hair behind her almost-elfin ears. "He's got to be good at something, and it might as well be something you're not." Thor rolled his eyes again, and pushed the book back at Loki, who brushed a stray black hair out of his eyes and looked at his feet.

"But we can't take him… _you know where_," he said, almost plaintively, and Sif laughed.

"Loki wouldn't tell!" she scoffed, and bent down a little, looking Loki straight in the eye. "Loki, would you tell if we went somewhere Odin told us not to?"

Loki hesitated. On one hand, they couldn't go _anywhere_ outside of Asgard without Heimdall knowing, and he trusted the enormous golden Asgardian to save them from their own stupidity. On the other hand, if Thor wanted to impress, and he usually did, there was no limit to what he might try.

However, his desire to be _involved_, to not be his brother's little shadow, baby Loki, made his head shake before he had even completed his train of thought.

"You see, Thor! Loki is cut from the same cloth as you," Sif teased, and Thor gave Loki a warning glare. He knew what that meant, and edged away from Sif as carefully as he could. "Well, where is this magical place?"

* * *

"We shouldn't be here," Loki whispered as the children traipsed across the Bifrost. "This is dangerous."

"Loki, you will never be a king if you do not become a man first," Thor said bravely. "Well, you will never be a king. But if you are to advise me as king, you should grow up anyway." Loki _resented_ Thor when he said things like that. It wasn't his fault he had been born three years too late to even hope of ascending to the throne. But one day he would be a mighty ruler of somewhere.

"Heimdall!" Sif hissed, and the children scuttled out of the gaze of the giant man. "Where is this place?"

"Hogun," Thor whispered, and Hogun pulled a slingshot from his pocket. He fired a shot, and they saw Heimdall's eternal attention falter slightly. Loki felt a horrible feeling in his stomach. Surely Thor was not brazen and idiotic enough to attempt to _use_ the Bifrost?

Hogun fired another rock, and as Heimdall plodded towards them, Loki saw in horror that he had left the sword in the enormous machine. Thor really _was that stupid_.

"Now"

But before he could argue, his hand had been grasped by Sif on one side and Volstagg on the other, and he was being hurried into the rainbow path.

"It was somewhere around… here!" Thor grinned, and pushed a few buttons.

Loki had the sickening feeling that somebody had kicked him really hard in the spine, and then… dark.

* * *

"This isn't it at _all_," Thor said in irritation, and Sif shivered, staring around at the cold, dark world they had landed in with her wide, dark, child's eyes. "This is _Jötunheim_, for the love of Yggdrasil!"

"We're in danger," Fandral said, looking about. "We should have told the others."

"If the adults had known, we would have been forbidden to come here!" Thor thundered. "Heimdall will come to get us soon, I know it. He saw where we went." He shivered. "Why is it so _cold_?"

"I'm rather warm," Loki volunteered, and got five annoyed, cold glares in return.

"Your lips have gone blue, baby brother," Thor jeered, and Loki felt a hot blush creep through his cheeks. "Are you sure you shouldn't live here instead of Asgard?"

"Leave him alone, Thor," Sif snapped. "This is all your fault." Loki blushed again, this time with pleasure, and stood up, tucking his hair nervously behind his ears. His blue eyes glowed in the gloom as he raised his hands.

"Let me try something," he ventured bravely, and breathed on his hands.

A flame flickered into life, and he smiled, concentrating harder until finally a small bonfire was blazing in his hands. The three friends and Sif gathered around it, cooing, and he enjoyed his moment in the sunlight as his skills were actually admired.

Then it was all ruined, as per usual, by Thor.

"Well done, you fool," the Asgardian snarled, and Loki looked at him. "Advertise our presence to every filthy giant in Jötunheim!" Loki withdrew his hands, and Sif glared a little at Thor before there was a roar. All six children grew close to each other, and Loki grasped Thor's hand without thinking. Thor didn't remove it, looking in fact as scared as Loki did.

"We should have told Father we were _here_," Loki whimpered, and there was another roar.

"Loki, you can do that fire trick. Go outside and see what's there," Thor ordered, and received a slap from Sif. "Ow!"

"He's a child!" Sif argued, despite the fact that they were _all_ technically children. "Where is the big brave Thor, fighter of the, ahem, 'filthy giants'?" There was an even louder roar this time, and Loki turned to the doorway. He could get them out of this. This was his time to shine, he knew it. But what spells did _he_ know that could fix this?

* * *

Laufey saw the little boy exit the cave, and smiled cruelly. Ah, the youngest cub of Odin, not old enough for the right to bear arms. He would see how Odin, the Allfather, would react when his son was speared to death for trespassing.

He stretched out his arm, and a spear grew out in glittering diamond ice. The boy looked around again, and raised a hand to his mouth, as if biting his nails. His fear would end soon.

Laufey threw the spear, and it flew, true and straight, and… completely failed to even catch the boy, instead going straight _through_ him as if he were nothing more than air.

Inside the cave, Loki clicked his fingers, his illusion vanishing, and backing away as there was a bay of disappointment.

* * *

"You just made them angry," Volstagg murmured, and Fandral nodded. Ah, good. Now, Loki felt humiliated as well as afraid. He backed away, and Thor strode forward, clearly having regained his courage in the time it took Loki to reveal their location.

"Let me handle this." He strode outside, and the others stood there in the dark. "_Jötunn! I, Thor Odinson, am not afraid of you! Come out and-_" There was a shriek of terror, and Loki threw Sif's hand off of his shoulder and raced outside. There, a frost giant held Thor up by the back of his tunic, and Thor was struggling and shrieking.

"_Get off my brother!_" Loki shouted, and threw up his hands, sending a blast of fire at the being. As droplets of water dripped from its arms, it smiled, and reached out a hand for him as well.

"Your pathetic charms do not hurt me, Loki Odinson," Laufey growled, and as his hand caught Loki's green collar-

A blinding light ripped through Jötunheim, and the children shielded their eyes as the Bifrost hit down next to them.

"Father!" Loki and Thor cried, one in joy, the other in utter despair. Odin looked at them scathingly with his one eye, and then bowed to Laufey.

"Odin," Laufey said, his voice a little scared. "I did not realise they were your whelps." Thor went to shout 'lies!' and Sif glared at him.

"I am sorry they trespass wrongly where the truce forbids them," Odin said, and Loki could feel the tense political ground they were tip-toeing on. "They merely committed a child's error."

Laufey placed Thor down, who ran to where Loki and Odin stood.

"This once, Asgardian," he said imperiously, trying to retain a sense of control. "We will allow them to go. But if you cannot keep your… _cubs_ in check," he growled, "we must take action. You grow weak, Allfather."

"When I am too weak to repel you from my lands, then I will have the loss that I deserve for not handing my throne to my son," Odin said indifferently, and Loki looked at Thor. "Now, we leave. Come," he said to the children.

* * *

Loki watched as Thor strode the entrance hall, boasting.

"I boldly rushed out to meet them," he told the enthralled others. Sif and the others had been taken to their parent's homes, and placed under their care with a little more than a stern warning. Loki and Thor had received a _lot_ more than a stern warning; Thor had left crying, and, after Loki's mildly blue skin tone had been put down to nothing more than prolonged exposure to the ices of Jötunheim wearing nothing more than a green tunic and thin trousers, he had received an admonishment from Odin and Frigga that had made his ears sting. He was the _sensible_ one, they told him. Why had he not _told_ them? Why had he tried to use _magic_ against the frost giants? Hadn't he realised he was risking a war?

And now he watched Thor boast how he had saved them all, and his stomach churned in… no. He wouldn't say it. He would never say he hated his brother, because he didn't. He loved his brother more than anything.

But he would take his shine, one day. He would not be his shadow forever.

And next time, he was telling the guard where they were all going.


End file.
